Life insurers new premium up 27% in May to Rs 10,610 crore

New Delhi, Jun 22 (PTI) The new premium collected by life insurers rose by 26.6 per cent in May to Rs 10,610.10 crore.

The insurers had collected new premium of Rs 8,382.67 crore in the same month of 2015.

Of all the 24 life insurers, private sector companies witnessed an increase of 25.8 per cent in new premium collection at Rs 3,248.35 crore for the month of May. It was at Rs 2,580.89 crore a year ago, data from insurance regulator Irdai showed.

However, for state-run Life Insurance Corporation of India (LIC), the collection from new premium rose to Rs 7,361.75 crore in May, up 27 per cent from the year-ago period.

Its new business premium stood at Rs 5,801.78 crore in the same month of 2015.

Among the top private sector performers, SBI Life, HDFC Standard Life, Exide Life, Kotak Mahindra Old Mutual Life showed healthy rise in their new business premium.

Their new collection rose to Rs 842.08 crore, up 156 per cent (from Rs 328.62 crore year ago); Rs 502.59 crore, up 38.3 per cent; Rs 127.46 crore, up 256 per cent and Rs 197.66 crore, up 41.4 per cent, respectively.

"We have effectively activated the various channels of our premium collection. Of the four-five such channels, individual agents and bank channels have been activated the most. Earlier the company was tapping potential from only a limited bank branches", Arijit Basu, MD & CEO SBI Life Insurance said.

But last year onwards, the banking channels as well as the individual agents have been incorporated in a massive manner to sell insurance products, Basu said.